The Quest To Regain Egypt's Antiquities

One of the first artifacts that visitors see in the entrance of the Egyptian Museum in Cairo is a fake. It is a reproduction of the Rosetta Stone and unfortunately it is not the only replica.
Today I found out on BBC News that Egyptian Archeologists will travel to the Louvre Museum to collect five ancient fresco fragments stolen from a tomb in the Vally of the Kings in the 1980's but it is reported that there are many other stolen antiquities which they also want back.
The original Rosetta Stone is kept in British Museum. The Stone dates back to 196 BC and was very important for the modern decipherment of the hieroglyphics because it has two Egyptian language scripts (hieroglyphs and demotic) and one in classical Greek. It was discovered by the french in 1799 and given to the English under the terms of the treaty of Alexandria is one the most high profile items that Egypt's chief archeologist would like returned.
Another artifacts that they wish to be returned is the 3,500-year-old bust of Queen Nefertiti, wife of the famous Pharaoh Akhenaten that I mentioned before in this blog.
It is also reported in BBC News that thousands of artifacts were spirited out of Egypt during the period of colonial rule and afterwards by archeologists, adventurers and thieves. According to a 1972 United Nations agreement, artifacts are the property of their country of origin and pieces smuggled out must be returned.
"I am very happy that story became very big because this will warn every museum all over the world not to buy stolen artifacts," says Mr Hawass. (Egyptian Supreme Council of Antiquities) "This will preserve the heritage not only of Egypt but of whole World."

Interiors by Woody Allen

I recently saw the film "Interiors" by Wood Allen which was released in 1978. The film is considered to be Bergmanesque which means that it has been largely influenced by Bergman films which the director doesn't hesitate to agree with the idea. I find the film very important in the sense that I thought that the whole film was an attempt to make a large definition of art or history of art.It is about personal feelings (interiors) that we all possess as individuals and it is about how hard it is to find a way to express ourselves. It is about a family, three sisters, a mother and a father, and sister's husbands. The father is a successful lawyer in New York and he is in his late sixties. The mother is interested in art in general and because of that all his daughters are somehow related to art business. The older sister is a poem writer who is very successful at what she does, the other sister doesn't really know what to do but she is looking for a way to express her feelings through several mediums and the elder sister is an actress who appears mostly on television serials and B movies. One day, the father, suddenly decides to leave her wife and go on by his own. Devastated by the idea, the mother goes into depression and tries to kill herself several times. And the relations in the family becomes very complicated. In a way, the mother wants her husband back but the father already meets with someone and decides to marry her.
Now you may ask, what has got all of these to do with art. Actually, I am much more interested in oral references that the film provides us. During the film, we hear the characters talking about Henri Matisse, African Masks, Ancient Greek Architectures and churches in Europe. And I believe that these are the essential key points that the director wants us to look at.
When the father and the mother first meet after their separation, the mother mentions about the exhibition of a Matisse painting in New York. In 1908, Matisse wrote "A work of art must carry in itself its complete significance and impose itself upon the beholder even before he can identify the subject matter." That was one of the first overt claims that an artist's responsibility is only to himself and that he is bound by no rules in seeking to express himself.


But is this what the father wanted? Let's try to understand his new girlfriend which he is about to marry. The first time he introduces his girlfriend to his daughters, they are shocked by her relaxed and open behavior and that makes them sick. The reason why is because the daughters cannot be that open minded and free in expressing whatever they like to say. The women unlike them is not sophisticated intellectuality but knows how to enjoy life, how to dance, how to drink and eat. And in a particular time, the father mentions her passion to the African Masks and talks about her collections. Now if we think about African art and masks in general, we will understand that most them influenced impressionism and therefore modernism. Artists such as Picasso for example were also collectors of African Masks because they were in fact fascinated by the way they found ways to express themselves, for them what was important was not representing the reality but the reality they saw or imagine. There work was based on essentials and they were mostly abstract. For this subject matter, I believe it is very important to read the first chapters of "The Story of Art" by Gombrich to get a better understanding.


Later on, in the diner, the couple mentions about their trip to Greece, Athens. And the women later adds that she has been in Europe before and visited all the churches and she was sick of it. But she was fascinated by the architecture of Athens. We all know that for years in Europe, churches had great impact in art making. It was only after the churches lost their power in the eighteen century that art became a more self centered craft. Therefore I find very important to look at the scene where the father declares that he is going to marry with someone else. There are in the church.

Futurism and Sport Design

The movement of Futurism was an artistic and social movement which was launched in Paris (even though it is completely Italian) with a document "The Founding and Manifesto of Futurism" published in Le Figaro on 20 February, 1909. The Manifesto was written by the Italian poet Flippo Tomasso Marinetti.
"Then the silence deepened. But, as we listened to the old canal muttering its feeble prayers and the creaking bones of sickly palaces above their damp green beards, under the windows we suddenly heard the famished roar of automobiles."
We affirm that the world's splendor has been enriched by a new beauty, the beauty of speed. A racing car whose hood is adorned with great pipes, like serpents of explosive breath - a roaring car that seems to ride on grapeshot - is more beautiful that the "Victory of Samothrace."
I wrote some of the passages from the manifesto which I find very important to summarize the whole idea. Futurism, in fact, was against the idea of the Italian past. They celebrated the love of speed, technology and violence. For them, what was essential was the technological triumph of man over nature.
One of the important artist of the movement was the sculptor and the painter Umberto Boccioni with his work Unique of Continuity in Past (1913). Boccioni's works represented a style of movement and a new dynamic concept. He wanted shapes to suggest motion and movement. The shapes created by Boccioni is seen as the precursor to the aerodynamics elements used today in sport design: sport cars, motor cycles, helmets and ski boots. They influenced future aerodynamics shapes, polimaterics, style and inventions which I find very interesting.
For more info, you can check the website below.
http://www.montebellunadistrict.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=25&Itemid=31

The Virtual Museum of Iraq

The National Museum of Iraq, also known as Baghdad Archeological Museum was established in 1926 by the British traveler and author Gertrude Bell. Bell along with T.E. Lawrence, helped to define the outline of the modern state of Iraq. She had a major role during the Arab revolt in World War I and she proposed borders within Mesopotamia to include the three Ottoman Empire villayets that later became Iraq.
The National Museum of Iraq's collections are among the most important in the world because of the archeological riches of Mesopotamia. It contains important artifacts from the over 5'000 year of history of Mesopotamia. It was closed in 1991 during the Gulf War, and was not re-opened until April 28, 2000, on the birthday of Saddam Hussein.
In 2003, thousands of artifacts and collections were looted during the Iraq War even though several antiquities experts and representatives from the American Council for Cultural Policy asked Pentagon and the UK government to ensure the museum safety from both combat and looting. U.S. forces did avoid bombing the site and the museum.
The Virtual Museum of Iraq offers visitors the opportunity to move through eight visual galleries and see highlights from the collection from Prehistoric, Sumerian, Akkadian and Neo - Sumerian, Babylonian, Assyrian, Achaemenid and Seleucid, Parthian and Sasanian and Islamic. There are also animated video clips, texts and 3d representations of the artifacts which I think makes it very interesting. What I really liked was the terracotta lions from the Babylonian Hole, there are actually two and are thought to be from separate periods. They actually show how terracotta was used for architectural decorations instead of more valuable materials like metal and stone. They are situated in the short staircase of the temple Nisaba and Haja.
You can access the virtual museum by this link and discover the Mesopotamia online!

http://www.virtualmuseumiraq.cnr.it/